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PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS 



General William T. Sherman 



Major-G.eneral Grenville M* Dodge 



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Delivered at the Twenty-Eighth Annual Encampment, Depart- 
ment of lowa^ Grand Army of the Republic, 
May 2J, 1902, Des Moines, Iowa 



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I 




Personal Recollections of 
General William Tecumsch Sherman 

As a soldier of the Union, General Sherman, by com- 
mon consent, stands second only in a galaxy of great 
commanders such as no single cycle in the annals of time 
can parallel. This is the verdict of the most superficial 
reader and of the most diligent student of history. 

A reference to the official list of battles, skirmishes, 
and other contests, from April 15, iSGl, to the close of the 
war, develops the astounding fact that for every day, in- 
cluding Sundays, of those four years there were at least 
three of these struggles. If in such a death grapple Gen- 
eral Sherman rose to the highest rank among the victors, 
it cannot but be interesting to turn back to the circum- 
stances of his j)arentage and scan the surroundings of his 
youth to find, if Ave can, the formative influences which 
moulded the plastic tendencies of his nature into the 
lofty and harmonious individuality which marked him 
out for eminent leadership. 

Both his father and grandfather had been learned in 
the law. His father not only mastered the intricacies of 
Coke and Littleton, but made himself familiar with what- 
ever was worthy of reading outside of the books of the 
law, and was therefore fitted to shine in the domain of 
general literature as well as in the realm of technical jur- 
isprudence. It was this gifted man who, when his third 
son was born, proposed to bestow upon him the name of a 
celebrated chieftain — as if seeing the child's future mili- 
tary career. Judge Sherman entertained a warm admira- 
tion for the celebrated Indian chief Tecumseh. This sin- 
gular Indian was gifted with rare endowments, which 
gave him great prominence amongst his tribal allies, and 
a commanding influence over his followers of the forest. 
Nature had made him a soldier, and he was a statesman 
by intuition. Farseeing in plan, wary to win, sagacious 
to combine, and inflexible to execute, these qualities 
made him a formidable leader and also a dangerous op- 
ponent. He was not habitually ruthless or croiel in his 
warfare; on the contrary, many acts of mercy, of gener- 
ous chivalric protection, are recorded of him that would 
grace the annals of the knight errantry of old. It was 

• • • 

l2Ja'05 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 3 

the name of this renowned Indian that Judge Sherman 
bestowed upon the new-born son. Shortly after, at a so- 
cial gathering in his house, Judge Sherman was remon- 
strated with, half in pla}' and half in earnest, for perpet- 
uating in his family the savage Indian name. He only 
replied, but it w^as with seriousness, "Tecumseh w^as a 
great warrior," and the affair of the name was settled, 
never to be changed, even as in the ease of General Grant 
by dictum of West Point and the War Department. 

A single apt remark will sometimes reveal to the ex- 
perienced and observant a clearer view than will be pro- 
duced by long and labored description. Such a remark 
General Sherman once made to a lady, and the story was 
narrated by her to a party of friends, since the general's 
death. She was, many years ago, visiting her intimate 
friends the family of Judge Wright, in Washington, 
where she frequently met General Sherman and his 
brother, the distinguished Senator. The Wrights and 
the Shermans, as she learned, had been next door neigh- 
bors in childhood, and in their childhood days both fami- 
lies w^ere large. On one occasion the General, in his ani- 
mated way, Avas describing to this young lady how the 
two families of children had been accustomed to con- 
stantly play wth each other, there being a private gate- 
way giving communication between the two houses. At 
this point the young lady jokingly remarked that she 
wondered that they had not sometimes got mixed up 
when bed-time came. "Oh," said the General, laughingly, 
in his quick, impulsive Avay, "We were mixed up all the 
time; there was a nightly swopping of bed-fellows, and 
neither mother could be always sure whether her boys 
w^ere sleeping at home or at her neighbor's." 

At another time the General confided to her the inter- 
esting fact that he used to enjoy stealing Dominie 
Wright's Sunday stock of kindling-wood, late on Satur- 
day evening, on account of the supposed embarrassment 
that would result to the pious preacher on the morrow — 
thus giving away the secret that he had been subject to 
some of the weaknesses of the average boy. 

Professor Howe was for many years an educator of con- 
siderable local reputation in an Iowa town. During and 
subsequent to the war he was in the habit of telling on 
all fitting occasions, with great pride, of his having been 
in former years the instructor of the Sherman children, in 
Lancaster, Ohio. They were, according to his story, very 
promising and very interesting pupils, on the whole, but 



4 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

very obstreperous on some occasions, before he finally 
succeeded in getting tlieni under control. To get to this 
control he found it necessary to give the brothers a sound 
thrashing. They resisted; the battle was fierce and pro- 
tracted, but the i)edagogue came out the conqueror, 
though himself in a. sadly dilapidated condition. 

After Sherman became General of the Army, a gentle- 
man, who had heard of this story, happened to be trav- 
elling with Genei-al Sherman up the Hudson river to 
West Point. During a conversation with the General it 
ocurred to him to ask the question: "General, did you 
ever attend the school of a certain Professor Howe?" 
"Sam Howe?" was the response, "Why, yes; he used to 
lick John and me like hell." This was regarded a;S con- 
firmation of the truth of the aforesaid story. When Pro- 
fessor Howe died at an advanced age, a few years ago, 
one of his children mailed a copy of his obituary to Gen- 
eral Sheiiaan, wldch elicited this characteristic response: 

HEADQUAETEKS U. S. ARMY. 

Wasliington, D. C., April 26, 1877. 
Warrington Howe, Esq. : 

Dear Friend: I have received your letter with the 
newspaper slip containing the full and just tribute to 
3'-our father, the late Samuel L. Howe. I regret extremely 
that in my perambulations over this great country of late 
years I never had the chance to meet your father, which 
I wanted to do. And now, though forty long, eventful 
years have passed since I left his school at Lancaster, 
Ohio, I can recall his personal appearance to mind as 
clearly as though it were yesterday. I have always borne 
willing testimony to his skill and merits as a, teacher, and 
am sure that the thorough modes of instruction in arith- 
metic and grammar pursued by him prepared me for easy 
admission to West Point, and for a respectable standing 
in my class, I have heard from time to time of the 
cnanges that attended his useful career, and am glad to 
learn that he left behind the flourishing academy at Mt. 
Pleasant, Iowa, witli children qualified to take up his 
work where he left it off, and carry it to completion. 

I beg you will convey to your mother the assurance of 
my great respect and sympathy in her affliction. I recall 
her also to memory, a young mother, living in the house 
of "Pap" Boyle, close by the school house built by ]Mr. 
Howe in the old orchard, and it is hard for me to realize 
that she is now a widow and a grandmother. I feel sure, 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 5 

iiowever, that Mr. Howe has left behind him hundreds 
and thousands that revere his memory, and will perpetu- 
ate it by deeds and virtues which his exam]3le and precept 
suggested. Truly your friend, 

\y. T. Sherman. 

I have thus dwelt upon the youth and parentage of 
General Sherman, because, in addition to the interest 
which naturally attaches to that part of a great man's 
life, but little attention has been hitherto given to it, even 
in his own incomparable memoirs. 

The first time J came into personal contact with Gen- 
eral Shennan was in September, 1863. I was lying very 
ill at Corinth; and was Commander of that District. Gen- 
ei'al Grant had ordered Sherman west from Memphis, to 
rebuild the road through to Decatur, with a view of aid- 
ing Rosecrans in his campaign against Bragg, or at any 
rate to make a demonstration upon Bragg's communica- 
tions. General Sherman brought with him an open let- 
ter from General Grant to me. He came in and sat down 
by my bedside and read the letter, which was very com- 
I>limentary to me and my command. The substance of 
the letter was that when General Sherman reached my 
command I was to take from it whatever troops could be 
spared, and accompany him in his movement to the East, 
After Sherman read the letter from Grant, he said: 
"Now, are you well enough to do what General Grant sug- 
gests?" I said, '"Yes.'' He said, "All right, I will give 
you plenty of time, and you can bring up the rear, and I 
will issue the orders." 

Sherman was then Commander of the Fifteenth Army 
Corps, that was crossing the country from INIemphis to 
Decatur. Soon after his visit to nie I received the follow- 
ing letter from him, which will show you his method of 
treating a subordinate who was to command one of his 
units : 

HEAD QES. 15TH ARMY CORPS. 

Oct. 22(1, 18G3, 
Gen, G, M. Dodge, Corinth. 

Dear General: I thank you for the budget of news, 
which is most serviceable as we can approximate the 
truth. Of course here I am balked by Bear Creek, which 
is a worse place than was represented to me, 

I have my three leading divisions across Bear Creek, 
and all hands are busy at the bridge and trestles. We 
have lost 8 killed and about 35 wounded, in all. 
Among the dead is Col. Torence, 30th Iowa. I think it is 



6 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

well established that Lee, who came from Jackson, Clin- 
ton and Canton with about 4,000 good cavalry, is to my 
front with Eody's brigade; and I think also that Wheeler's 
cavaliy has been driven out of Tennessee, and it is now 
resting between here and Decatur. 

If all of this cavalry turns on me, I will have a nice 
time, but can't heli3 it. And if Porter gets me up some 
boats to Eastport I will checkmate them. The Tennessee 
is in very fair boating order for four feet, and I expect 
daily a boat up from Cairo, also a ferry boat. I have had 
the river examined well, and am more than satisfied we 
cannot ford, even on the shoals. 

Of course I don't believe the report you sent of the cap- 
ture of Banks and 15 regiments. Dick Taylor was some- 
where west of the river, between Alexander and Shreve- 
port. That is ground familiar to me, and I know Dick 
Taylor cannot get to the east side of the Mississippi with 
anything like an army. After the capture of Vicksburg 
we relaxed our efforts and subsided. The secesh, on the 
contrary, increased theirs amazingly. The rascals display 
an energy worthy a better cause, bad as it is, but when 
they come to the finish they don't fight equal to their 
numbers. Chalmers' dispatch is a sample. He captured 
the camp of the 7th Ills., off on Hatch's expedition, and 
nothing else of moment. But he may again attempt the 
road, yet Hurlbut has plenty to checkmate him if he 
don't attempt to follow, but anticipates and interposes 
the R. R. and Tallahatchee. 

I propose to finish the bridge and move on Tuscumbia, 
but in the end may actually cross to Eastport. My orders 
are fully comprehended in their drawing from Rosecrans 
the cavalry that have heretofore bothered him. 

I had a regiment at Eastport. A party crossed over 
who saw no one, but hear the river was patrolled so as to 
report all movements. I will fortify this place somewhat, 
so that if the enemy's cavali'y attem]3t to operate against 
it they will catch more than they bargain for. Corinth is 
too formidable a place for them to dream of an attack, 
but you should keep a couple of regiments disposable to 
take the offensive. 

I am obliged to you for all information, and will impart 
all positive information to you. Keep me well advised 
from day to day of Fuller's approach. I have one brigade 
at Burnsville, two here, and three divisions front of Bear 
Creek. Yours, 

W. T. Sherman, Maj. Genl. 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 7 

It was about October 24, 1863, that Sherman was given 
command of the Army of the Tennessee, and it was the 
next day I received this order: 

HE ADQUARTEKS DEPT. OF THE TENNESSEE. 

Oct. 25, 1863. 
General Dodge, Corinth. 

I wish you to prepare to make up the best possible divi- 
sion of troops to be taken from those nowin your own divi- 
sion and such others as on railroad guard duty, not belong- 
ing to any of the organized brigades of Hurlbut's corps. 
You to command it and to accompany the movement up 
the valley of the Tennessee. Our object is to secure abso- 
lute footing up the valley of the Tennessee and the river, 
giving us a certain supply to Eastport now, and Florence 
very soon. We can rislv the railroad, or use it as long as 
we can. Is your health equal to it? Come up and see me 
on the subject. Yours, 

W. T. Sherman, Maj. Genl. 

I got on a locomotive, taking a doctor with me, and 
visited Sherman. On the 27th of October, Sherman 
received Grant's dispatch to drop all railway repairs east 
of luka and move as rapidly as possible to Chattanooga. 
The plans were then formed for crossing the Tennessee, 
and I was able from my know^ledge of the country to aid 
him in putting his army across. 

You all know the history of that rapid march to Chat- 
tanooga. I do not propose to go into it in detail. I drew 
from my commands troops for two divisions, and Sher- 
man organized them immediately into a corps command. 
As we marched along he was in the habit of writing back 
personal letters to each of us who commanded a. unit, and 
telling us where he thought we would find the best means 
of feeding our commands, because we w^ere living off the 
country, only transporting sugar, coffee and bacon. 

When he got into Elk River county with the Fifteenth 
Army Corps, he T\Tote me back a note saying, "The Fif- 
teenth Armj' Corps has cleaned up everything as they 
Avent along; you had better not follow them; I do not 
think you Avill find a chicken in their trail, and my advice 
is to push further north, say towards Pulaski or Colum- 
bia, and let me know what route you take." I changed 
the direction of my column towards Columbia as he had 
suggested and reported my movements. 

While on this march I received the following letter: 



8 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

HEAD QRS. ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE. 

Bridgeport, Nov. 18tb, 1863. 

Dear General : Your letter enclosing coi^j of 3'our 
order is received. I heartily approve your order, and 
think it right to make citizens earn good treatment. They 
can suppress guerrillas^ — I know it, and on my threat at 
Florence they brought in a. man captured by guerillas at 
Gravelly Springs. Keep your infantry so that you can 
concentrate, and let your cavaliT watch well down to the 
mouth of the Elk on both sides. Don't let the enemy draw 
any supplies from north of the Tennessee. 

I have been up to Chattanooga, Their ix>or mules and 
horses tell the tale of hoiTid iY)ads and no forage. I hate 
to put ours up in that mountain gorge. The two divisions 
have gone forward and tw^o more follow tomorrow. I go 
to Chattanooga tomoiTow, and think many days cannot 
elapse before we bring on a fight. It is intended to act 
quick as Longstreet has gone up to East Tennessee. 

General Grant says that everything has been done to 
push the work on the Nashville and Decatur road, but 
work on the railroad moves slow\ Write me fully and 
frequently, and send me all the statistical information 
that I may stow^ it away for the future. Your sketch of 
your route shows Pulaski a good place from which to 
operate. I wall try and get some more cavalry from the 
north." 

I w^as greatly disappointed on receiving this letter, and 
a letter which he enclosed me from General Grant, telling 
me to rebuild the roads in Central Tennessee. I answered 
General Sherman from Pulaski on the 23d. The first sen- 
tence of my letter let him know how disappointed I was; 
it was as follows : "I am in receipt of your letter of Nov. 
ISth written at Bridgeport, and if a fight comes off at 
Chattanooga and we are not in it, we will be sadly disap- 
pointed, but take it for granted it is for the best." 

After the battle of Chattanooga, I received the folh^w- 
ing message: "We are all right. We defeated Bragg nn 
^lissionary Ridge and our troops are pursuing. I start at 
once for the head of my column. Keep your troops well 
in hand, and I hope soon to come fo you, and we will then 
make all right south and west of Decatur." 

After the Chatanooga campaign Sherman marched to 
'Knox^ille. As soon as Longstreet knew he w^as en route, 
he left. Shennan brought back the Army of the Tennes- 
see and scattered it from Columbia alons: the line of the 
Nashville and Decatur road, and from Athens to Bridge- 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 9 

poi't along the line of the Memphis aud Charleston road, 
with directions to fit up our command ready for a spring 
cami>aign; remount our cavalry, replenish our teams; in 
fact ga,ve us carte blanche to do everything necessary to 
put our commands in good condition for the campaign 
Grant had in view. 

While we were lyiug there carrying out these orders 
and I was rebuilding the railroads, Sherman tookMcPher- 
son and, with a portion of their staff, went to A'icksburg 
and with the troops there made the campaign to Merid- 
ian, December 12, 1SG3, leaving Logan and myself in the 
Department of the Cumberland, without a commander, to 
take care of ourselves, and tO' do the best we could; and it 
was while we were lying there, during that winter, that 
differences occurred between Logan and Thomas, which 
prevented the api>ointment of Logan to the command of 
the Army of the Tennessee upon the death of McPherson. 
It all arose from simple annoyances; Logan being of an 
authoritative disposition, and having been with a little 
army that held its way and was omnipotent where it 
stood, could not understand why he could not send one 
of his own soldiers or officers over the railroads in an- 
other General's department with his own pass, without 
applying to General Thomas' staff for transportation. 
This brought on a conflict between Thomas and Logan, at 
first no bigger than your hand, but finally growing into a 
matter of considerable moment. When Generals Sher- 
man and McPherson returned from their Meridian raid, 
]March 17, ISGl, Sherman was appealed to bybothof these 
officers, and, desiring peace, used all his ingenuity to 
soften matters and satisfy Logan and Thomas; but 
neither really forgave the other for the differences, that 
then occurred. 

My troops having been distributed from Columbia to 
Decatur rebuilding that road, living off the country, no 
doubt committed depredations, and wyere often reported 
to Thomas as a lot of ruffians, and a great many questions 
arose between the commanders in his department. I was 
busy rebuilding the railroad and did not give them atten- 
tion. These complaints reached General Thomas, who 
forwarded them to Grant, and General Grant put a char- 
acteristic endorsement upon the complaints, which were 
very severe, upholding my troops as they had been for 
three months living off the counti-y, as we had neither rail 
or water communication. 



lo PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

It was while lying here that Grant was ordered to 
Washington, and in March, 1864, on Sherman's return 
from the Meridian campaign, the Corps Commanders, 
with General Rawlins and one or two others, among them 
General Sheridan, were ordered to Nashville, where we 
met Generals Grant and Sherman. Sherman'si first sug- 
gestion was that we should go to the theater. We were 
all dressed in our rough, campaigning clothes, in fact we 
had nothing else with us, as we had not been able to get 
any supplies since we left the Mississippi. That night we 
went to the theater, paid our way in, and obtained seats 
in the front row in the balcony. The play of "Hamlef 
was upon the boards. You all know what a fine Shake- 
spearean critic Sherman was. The play was simply being 
butchered — to the great amusement of a theater full of 
soldiers, who were either coming from leave of absence or 
going upon one. No one in the audience seemed to re^^og- 
nize us, and we sat there quite a while. Sherman, ^ho 
was sitting next to me, talked so loudly about the play 
that everybody could hear him. He said : "Dodge, that is 
no way to play Hamlet!" and he went om so excitedly that 
I said to him two or three tmes "General, don't talk so 
loud, some of the boys will discover us, and there will be 
a scene." But he was so indignant at the butchery of the 
play that he could not keep still. During the grave-dig- 
gers' scene, where Hamlet picks up the skull of Yorick 
and soliloquizes upon it, a soldier in the back part of the 
audience rose up and halloed out at the top of his voice, 
"Say, pard, what is it, Yank or Eeb?" Of course, the 
whole house came down, and Grant said, "We had better 
get out of here." We left, and nO' one knew that the 
two gTeat soldiers of the age had been there listening. 

Within a day or two we were sent back to our com- 
mands. Grant was desirous of taking some of the officers, 
who had served with him in the west, to the eastern army. 
Sherman protested, desiring to have his army left intact, 
but Sheridan was finally selected and taken, against his 
protest, all the rest being left. Sherman went with Grant 
as far east as Cincinnati. During the reunion of the Army 
of the Tennessee at Cincinnati, in 1889, at the banquet in 
the Burnett House, Sherman pointed out to me the room 
where Gra,nt and he sat down with their maps and came 
to their agreement as to the general movement that was 
to be made in Grant's campaign in ^lay, 1861, which was 
to close the war. The agreement, as Sherman stated It 
to me, was for each to take care of the enemy in his part 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN n 

of the country, and Grant was to move all of the armies 
at; once. Both agi'eed that they would each hold the 
enemy in their front; that although the rebels had the in- 
terior lines it would be the duty of each to prevent the 
movement of any of the enemy's forces from the front of 
one to the other;. and we all know how well they accom- 
plished their purpose. 

Grant said, to Sherman, "If Lee sends any of his troops 
to your front, I will send you as many men as he sends 
Johnston," and during the campaign Sherman often said 
"We must press Johnston so that under no circumstances 
can they detach a corps or any part of their command to 
reinforce Lee." 

After the battle of Chattanooga the government had 
been issuing and selling rations to the citizens of Ten- 
nessee. When General Sherman prepared for his Atlanta 
campaign he knew that its success depended upon his 
ability to feed his men and animals, and he, therefore, 
issued Order No. 8, stopping this issue to citizens. In a 
few days he received this dispatch from President Lin- 
coln, dated May 4, 1864 : 

"I have an imploring appeal from the citizens, who say 
your Order No. 8 will compel them to go north to Nash- 
ville. This is in no sense an order, nor is it even a request 
that you will do anything which in the least shall be a 
drawback upon your military operations, but anything 
you can do consistently with the appeals of these suffer- 
ing people I should be glad of." 

On May 5th General Sherman sent an answer charac- 
teristic of the man and General : 
A. Lincoln, President. 

We have worked hard with the best talent of the coun- 
try, and it is demonstrated that the railroad cannot sup- 
ply the army and the people too ; one of them must quit, 
and the army does not intend to unless Joe Johnston 
makes us. The issues to citizens have been enormous, and 
the same weight of corn and oats would have saved thou- 
sands of mules whose carcasses now corduroy the roads, 
and which we need so much in war. I will not change my 
order, and I beg of you to be satisfied that the clamor is 
partly humbug and for effect. I advise you to tell the 
bearers of the appeal to hurry to Kentucky and make up 
a column of cattle and wagons and go over the mountains 
on foot by Cumberland Gap and Somerset to relieve their 
suffering' friends, as they used to before the railroad was 
built. Tell them thev have no time to lose. We can re- 



12 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

lieve all actual suffering by each company and. regiment 
giving their sa\TLngs. Every man who is willing to fight 
and work gets a lull ration, and all who will not fight 
and work we offer them free passage in the cars." 

In Ajjril, 1864, the first intimations were sent, confiden- 
tially, to the corps commanders for the concentration of 
our forces and the movement of our troops. During my 
command in Middle Tennessee I had raised several regi- 
ments of colored troops, with General Sherman's 
approval, although he was criticised very severely for tak- 
ing no colored troops with him. His answer to me on 
that criticism was : "I propose to leave the colored troops 
to occupy our lines of communication wheretheycan have 
the protection of entrenchments, and a chance to drill; 
and I do not propose in this campaign that the rebels 
shall say that it was necessary for me to whip them, to 
take part of their niggers to do it." 

So, in April, when he sent his orders, I wrote him that 
I proposed to take everj^ white soldier on my line with 
me, and he, without answering my letter, sent me an 
order to go forward with my forces, but to leave one white 
brigade (naming its commander) at Decatur; and in pur- 
suance to these commands I commenced marching 
towards Ghattanooga. When I was about half way there 
I received a note from General McPherson telling me to 
put my forces upon the cars and with my ammunition 
reach Chattanooga before the 5th of May, leaving my 
trains to follow by wagon road. We arrived there on the 
morning of the 5th witliout tents or rations, and I imme- 
diately repaired to General Sherman's headquarters, 
where we found our army commander, General McPher- 
son, waiting for us. I remember that at the breakfast 
table at the hotel I was greatly surprised to find the 
knives and forks chained to the table, and concluded that 
the reputation of Sherman's bummers had preceded us. 

Sherman had e^ddentlyhad aconsultationwiththearmj' 
commanders before I arrived, because he said to McPher- 
son : "I think I had better read Dodge these dispatches," 
and then he sat down and read those celebrated dis- 
patches that passed between Grant and himself from May 
1st to 5th, which you have all seen published. W^hen he 
had finished he said "Now, Dodge, you see what you have 
to do. Where are your troops?" I said: "They are un- 
loading." He said to McPherson: "I think you had bet- 
ter send Dodge to take Ship's Gap tonight." McPherson 
§iaid: "Why General, that is thirty miles away." Sher- 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 13 

man said: ''Xo matter, let him try it.-' I aslied for a 
guide, and McPhersou said ii they could find one they 
would send him to me. Sherman gave me a map with the 
road and gap, known as Ship's Gap, in the first range of 
mountains, marked, that I was to capture, and that night 
about nndnight General Sprague, commanding a brigade 
of Yeatch'S division of the IGth army corps, reached the 
summit of the gap, and made the first opening through 
that range of mountains. This enabled us to pass through 
Snake Creek Gap before the enemy discovered the move- 
ment to their rear. To my own surprise and to the sur- 
prise of everybody else, we jmshed through that long nar- 
row gorge before midnight of the Sth, one day ahead of 
the time fixed, "uiiere one regiment of caA^airy properh^ 
jjosted could have held us and forced a battle. Johnston's 
troops did not attack us until the morning of the 9th, so 
that the first plans of Sherman, as he has said to me, were 
so successful and so satisfactory that he thought the 
Army of the Tennessee should have planted itself across 
the railroad near Eesaca in the rear of Johnston, which 
u'ould have forced him to abandon his trains and fight us, 
or make a long detour to the east. Tliat question has 
been fought over in the papers, and by the diiferent 
officers, bv^t Sherman, up to the time of liis death, always 
felt and claimed that if the fifteen thousand men we had 
with us had been planted and intrenclied squarely in 
front of Resaca it would have broken up Johnston's army. 

I was too young an officer then to discuss these matters, 
but simply obeyed my orders, and I do not propose at this 
day to criticise the actions of General McPherson, or to 
pasi^ judgment upon the opinion of Sherman, because it 
can do no good. There is no question that there was never 
a bi*aver or more lo^ed and trusted General in our army 
than ^McPherson, and if he made a mistake, there is no 
person in or out of the army that does not know that he 
made it in the interest of what he considered to be his 
duty; and I claim that no one can now criticise him for it, 
for Sherman after it was all over, never did. Our rapid 
movement surprised Johnston, and accomplished the 
principal object of the movement to his rear, forcing him 
out of his impregnable position at Dalton, and driving 
hini south of the Ostanaula river. 

During the march from Chattanooga to Atlanta we 
were very short of all kinds of provisions, canned fruits, 
vegetables, etc. We lived off bread, beans and bacon. I 
had been suffering during the whole of the campaign, 



14 PEKSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

was run down. a. good deal physically, and I thought if I 
could get a change of food it would help keep me up. I 
went oyer to General Sherman's headquarters and asked 
him to allow me to send b}^ Lieutenant Bailey (who had 
been detailed from my command in charge of the mails 
running from Nashville to the fronts), to bring me down 
some dried fruits and yegetables. I told Sherman that I 
was running down; that I had a very bad wound in the 
side, and it seemed ifhpossible to keep it from sapping 
away my strength. Sherman looked at me and said: 
"Dodge, all you want is some good whiskey," and took me 
to his tent. Good or bad whiskey just then was entirely 
different to me from what it is now, but, of course, I sub- 
mitted. I urged my necessities upon the General, but he 
said it was impossible to alloAv me to bring forward any- 
thing; that if he did it for one he would have to do it for 
others; and I went away a good deal disappointed, which 
Sherman saw. There was no way to get anything with- 
out his permission. It was not more than a day or so 
after that that Colonel Dayton, his Adjutant, happened to 
be at my headquarters, and asked one of the staff officers 
if I had sent to Nashville for anything. The staff officer 
informed him that I had applied and could not get permis- 
sion, and that under the circumstances .1 would not send, 
Dayton told the staff officer if they could get it through 
by Bailey to do so, that General Sherman, he knew, would 
not object, but, says he, "You don't want to say anything 
to Dodge," and the first thing I knew there came to my 
headquarters a box of supplies. It was a long time after- 
wards before I knew how they had been brought there. It 
is the only case in my experience where Sherman relaxed 
one of his orders. 

The history of the Atlanta campaign has been written; 
nothing I can say about it can add to or take from it. It 
is the unwritten instances that I propose to talk about. I 
had a corps command all the way from Corinth, Miss., to 
Marietta, Ga., with only the rank of a Brigadier General. 
Probably there was never a greater effort made by Grant 
and Sherman to give me a rank suitable to my command, 
and avoid unpleasant complications, and as we marched 
down to Kenesaw, I was in command of that portion in 
the field of the 16th army corps of the Army of the Ten- 
nessee, with officers of much higher rank holding lesser 
commands. This brought upon me many remarks that 
my staff would hear and repeat to me, and was annoying 
and made me uncomfortable. I sat down and T\a^ote to 



GHNERAL W. T. SHERMAN 

General Sherman explaining to him fully that these criti- 
cisms had come to me, and that they made me feel very 
uncomfortable, that my staff were always talking about 
it; rumor stating that this officer and that officer was 
going to relieve me, and I said to Sherman that I thought 
he had better give me a command fitted to my rank, and 
relieve me and him. He put this endorsement upon the 
paper: "Suppose you wait until some one that has a right 
to complain does so ; and go ahead and do your duty, and 
not trouble yourself about others' business. W, T. Sher- 
man." He did not even sign it officially. He never 
referred to it during the w^ar, but afterw^ards poked a 
good deal of fun at me for uaj foolish action. He soon 
after sent me a telegraphic dispatch that came from the 
President telling him that he had relieved him from his 
difficulties about Dodge. M}^ commission reached me, 
and I donned my two stars. 

Sherman always sustained his officers who assumed 
great authority in an emergency, although they might 
be wrong. As an instance I give you the following: 

Before General Sherman crossed the Chattahoochee for 
his attack upon Atlanta, his army was stretched from 
Soap Creek to Sandtown Ferry, facing the river. My 
corps, the 16th, was upon the extreme right, and I 
thought the crossing was to be by the right flank as it 
was so much nearer to Atlanta, and my orders wei-e to 
sieze all ferry boats and other means of crossing. Gen- 
eral Sherman came to my headquarters, took out his map, 
and asked how long it would take me to construct a 
bridge across the river at Roswell some forty miles away 
beyond our extreme left, telling me it was rock bottom and 
could be forded, and that there was a road bridge at that 
point which the Confederates had destroyed. Isupposed 
I would have to go into the woods and cuit the timber, and 
told him it would require at least a week. He had not 
been gone more than an hour when I received orders from 
General McPherson to move to Eoswell, and that General 
Sherman would communicate directly with me. The 
march was a hot, dusty one, in the rear of the army, but 
T did not halt, except for our meals, and an occasional 
hour's rest. I received at Marietta a dispatch from Sher- 
man urging me to get there as soon as possible. 

On arriving, I immediately put a brigade across the 
river, and it was as fine a sight as I ever saw when 
Fuller's Ohio brigade, in line of battle, forded the river. 
The enemv's cavalrv hpJd the other side. As thev moved 



i6 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

across, lioldiiig their guns and cartridge boxes high above 
their heads, the bands of the corps struck up lively tunes- 
The rebels poured in a heavj' ttre, but it was t(jo higJi. 
Now and then a boy would step into a hole and disappear 
for a moment, but all got across and immediately sought 
shelter under the steep-cut bank, where Fuller reformt^d 
and made his charge, clearing out the enenn' in shoit 
order, and built a strong tete de i^ont. 

Eoswell had cotton and woolen factories that had been 
running up to the time that General Garrard's cavalry 
captured them, and burned most of the factories. Tlie 
operatives were mostly women, and these Garrard moved 
to Marietta by detailing a regiment of cavalry, each mem- 
ber of which toolc one of the operatives on his horse, and 
in this way they were all taken into ^Marietta, and were 
sent north by Sherman. Over the proprietor's house was 
flying a French flag. I saw immediately that if I utilized 
the balance of the buildings I could erect the bridge in 
Jialf the time, and instructed Captain Armstrong, who 
had charge of the 1,500 men detailed to build the bridge^ 
to tear clown the buildings which were left from Ger- 
rard's fire, and utilize them. The next morning some of 
my officers who were better lawyers than I was, told me 
that the proprietor w^as making a strong ])rotest, and that 
I was liable to get into trouble on account of violation of 
international law. Although I was using the material, T 
thought it best to write General Sherman a letter stat- 
ing what I had done, and Avhat the claims were, at the 
saine time notifying him that by using this mateiial T 
would have the bridge completed by Wednesday. T 
aa-rived there by noon on ^Monday, the lOth of July. Sher- 
man answ^ered in the following characteristic letter: 
HFADQUARTEKS JkllLn Ain^ DIVISION OF THE 
MISSISSIPPL 

Tn the Field near Chattahoochee River, July 11, 1804. 
General Dodge, Koswell, (la. 

T know you liave a big Job, but that is nothing new for 
vou. Tell General Newton that his corps is now up n^ar 
General Schofield's crossing, and all is quiet thereabout. 
Tie might send down and move his cami:>s to proximity of 
his corps, but I think Roswell and Shallow Fordsoimport- 
ant that I prefer him to be near you until you are ^ell 
fortified. If he needs rations tell him to get his wagons 
up, and I think you will be able to spare him day after 
tomorrow. I know the bridge at Roswell is important, 
and you mav destroy all Georgia to make it good and 
strong. W. T. Sherman, ]Major-General Commanding. 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 17 

You will perceive it is very diplomatic; he says notliiug 
iu relation to international law, or the French flag, but 
ends his letter by telling me that I may destroy all Georgia 
to accomplish what I am sent to do. Of course I read 
between the lines, and paid no further attention to the 
French flag. After the war great claims were made, and 
we were censured by the Government, which I have no 
doubt paid roundly for the factories. 

On July 12, just three days after I arrived there, I noti- 
fi.ed General Slu-rman that the bridge was completed, and 
the army commenced crossing on the final movement to 
Atlanta. Sherman was greatly surprised, as it had been 
represented to him by officers he had sent there that it 
would require a much longer time to erect the bridge. 

My official report read as follows: 

''A foot bridge 710 feet long was thrown across the 
river, and from ^[onday noon, July 10, until Wednesday 
night, July 12, a good, substantial, double track, trestle 
road bridge, 710 feet long and 11 feet high, was built by 
the pioneer corps from the command.'" 

As the 15th, Logan's corps, was crossing the bridge, 
there came up a terrific thunder storm, and several of the 
men were knocked down while on the bridge, and a bolt 
struck in the midst of ]Murray's regular battery of the 
16th corps, which was holding the bridge head across the 
river, killing and wounding several men. Naturally the 
superstition of the soldiers was aroused and all kinds of 
misfortunes were ]iredicted, and sure enough in the next 
engagement on the 22d of July, at the battle of Atlanta, 
the battery was captured while going from Blair's front 
to mine by the same skirmish line of Cleburne's division 
that killed General McE*herson on the road leading from 
my right to Blair's left. In fact, he fell right at the foot 
of one of the guns that had been captured. 

The moment our arni}^ crossed the bridge our movement 
upon Atlanta commenced. It was the 19th or 20th of 
July when one of the scouts, a boy of the 2nd Iowa Infan- 
try, who had been sent into the enemy's lines a long time 
b( fore, came out to my lines and brought the morning 
paper and the news of the change of commanders from 
General Johnston to General Hood. I took him over to 
the road upon Avhich Sherman was marching. He was 
with General Schofield's column. Sherman and Schofield, 
and someone else, whoui I cannot remember, discussed the 
ncAvs, and I remember distinctly Schofield giving his opin- 
ion of Hood — that it meant fight. AYhile " I stood there 



i8 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

listening- and watching, General Sherman sat down upon 
a stump and issued his orders that concentrated his 
armies and brought 3IcPherson from Stone Mountain, 
some twenty miles away, and closed us all in on Thomas, 
showing- he fully comprehended the situation. Soon after, 
Hood with his army attacked Thomas, intending to 
double him up from light to left, knowing how greatly ex- 
tended Sherman's forces were. After the battle of the 
20th we closed in around Atlanta. The concentration of 
the lines threw the 16th army corps in reserve, and a bri- 
gade of it was sent to the left of the army and encamped 
behind the 17th corps, and another brigade, Spra.gue's, 
was left at Decatur to i)rotect the trains. That night 
there was a belief that Hood would evacuate Atlanta; in 
the morning it was reported that he had done so, in fact 
I received from the extreme left where one of my brigades 
lay, reports to that effect from General Fuller. Later in 
the morning McPherson came to see me, as he was in the 
habit of doing; if there was any movement on hand he 
would come and tell us what he expected, and if not, he 
would have a kind,, encouraging word for us, or a compli- 
ment for what had been done the day before. He was a 
man who issued A^erV' few orders on the field, and in this 
resj)ect he was a good deal like Grant, who pointed out 
what was to be done, and expected you as commander to 
do it, without entering into details, but left us 'at liberty 
to do whatever was considered best in the changes of the 
fight or the movements of the troops, expecting us to 
accomplish what he had told us was his objective point. 
INIcPherson was the same way, and when a movement was 
on hand, or when the army lay in front of the enemv, 
McPherson was in the habit of coming around, sitting 
down, talking matters over, and finally getting up to the 
point without giving an order, simply giving us the bene- 
fit of his great experience. I know he came to me in this 
way frequently, because I was a young officer 
and likely, perhaps, to go wrong quicker than 
those who were veterans in the service. McPher- 
son that morning came to my headquarters and 
ordered me to move out to the left of Blair's 17th 
army corps, and when they moved to tlieir new position 
that he was that day intrenching, I was to join him and 
stretch as far tO' the left as possible, and if T saw a chance 
was to grab and hold the Macon road. It seems Sherman 
had intended to use my corps for a different purpose, and 
had ordered McPherson to assign the 16th corps to the 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 19 

breaking up of the railroads east towards and beyond 
Decatur, but this order I did not know anything about, 
nor did it reach me. McPherson receiyed the orders after 
giving me my orders, and did not send them to me, and it 
was wliile pursuing McPherson's order to move to the left 
tJiat at 12 o'clock on the 22d nearly all of Hood's army got 
to our rear and made that territic attack upon us, and 
after fighting from noon until midnight was defeated at 
all points. There is probably nothing in all Sherman's 
military career that he criticised more severely to himself 
and to his confidential friends than the fact that when 
this great battle was going on at the left, where thousands 
of men were being mowed down, where the roar of mus- 
ketry lasted from twelve at noon until midnight, he did 
not force the Army of the Cumberland and Ohio, over 
50,000 strong, which stood intact that day, not firing a 
gun, into Atlanta and take it, for there was nothing in 
Atlanta except Geogia militia and teamsters. Sherman's 
statement is that he requested General Thomas to attack 
Atlanta, and if possible go into it. He told him a great 
battle was going on to the left, because it is well known 
to every one in an army that one wing, when the wind is 
in the ojoposite direction, may fight a great battle, while 
the other wing miles away could only know of it by 
rumor. Thomas felt the enemy, and seeing the works held 
by the militia, answered that Hood'sarmy was in Atlanta, 
that the works were fully nmnned, and it was not pos- 
sible for it to be successfully attacked in his front. So all 
day long that little Army of the Tennessee, that was 
never known to give back one inch, fought and struggled 
and held its own against double its numbers, thinking and 
believing that morning would show Atlanta as theirs, 
for they knew that the whole of Hood's army was upon 
them. 

At 2 o'clock in the day McPherson fell. I had no knowl- 
edge of his death, although he was killed near my line, 
until I received word from General Fuller whom I had 
instructed to change front to his right and clean out the 
enemy between him and the 17th corps, that he had cap- 
tured the skirmish line of the enemy and taken from them 
General McPherson's field glasses and orders of Sherman 
to McPherson, and he felt that something had happened 
to McPherson. The first neAvs I received was that McPher- 
son had been wounded, not killed, and it was 4 o'clock in 
the afternoon when Logan came to me asking for help to 
retake the line on the Augusta road, where the enemy had 



20 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

broken through and captured DeGraw's battery; I gave 
-him Mersey's brigade, but e^en then he did not tell me he 
was in command of the army. He came to me as we were 
in the habit of doing, Logan, Blair and myself, when one 
was hard pushed and the other was not, we sent troops 
without orders where they were most needed. 

After the day's fight was over, and at ten o'clock at 
night, Logan called Blair and myself to- meet him, Logan 
then being in command of the army; we met in the rear 
of the 16th corps, under an oak tree- on the line of the 
Augusta railroad, and discussed the results of the day. 
The fighting on Blair's right and Logan's left at Bald Hill 
Avas still progTesising. We only knew then that we had 
held the enemy, and did not know how much we had i3un- 
ished them. 

Blair's men were in the trenches in some places on his 
front, the enemy held one side and he the other. The men 
of the IStli corps were still in their own line, tired and 
liuugry, but those of the 16th corps after their hard day's 
work w^ere busy throwing u]j intrenchments on the field 
they had held and won. At Logan's request I sent Mer- 
sey's brigade, which was in bivouac near us, to go in and 
relieve Blair's men at the critical point on Bald Hill. 

Logan and Blair thought that the Army of the Cumber- 
land or the Army of the Ohio should send a portion of the 
forces and relieve some of our exhausted men, and I was 
sent to see Sherman. My recollection now is that I met 
him in a tent, though it is said oflftcially that he had his 
headquarters at the Howard House. ^Vhen I met him 
he seemed surprised to see me, but greeted me cordially 
and spoke of the great loss of McPherson. I stated to him 
my errand. He turned upon me and said : ""Dodge, you 
whipped them today, didn't you?" I said: ^'Yes, sir." 
Then he said: ''Can't you do it again tomorrow?'' and I 
said, "Yes, sir." I bade him good night and went back to 
my command, resolving never again to be sent on such an 
errand. Sherman explained to me afterwards that he 
knew what orders he had giAcn to press Atlanta, and h(dd 
the forces in the intrenchments surrounding it, and he 
wanted it said that the little Army of the Tennessee had 
fought the great battle Avithout any help, and he knew 
from the punishment the rebel army had received that 
Hood Avould not dare to attack us in the morning. 

There is no doubt but that, when I saw Sherman that 
night, he had ascertained the facts from the reports of the 
different commanders that Atlanta was without an organ- 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 21 

ized force, and that rather than reinforce the little Army 
of the Tennessee, he Avished to impress the fact that he 
was responsible for not taking Atlanta, and did not pro- 
l^ose to relieve himself of an}^ criticisms. He has since 
said to ns in his own qniet way, that he thonght we ought 
to have taken Atlanta that day, but I have never heard 
him make any criticism, or make auy claim that any 
officer was to blame for not doing it, except himself; while 
they who watched and were a. part of that great battle 
seemed to think that Thomas with 50,00:') veterans ought 
to have poured into Atlanta, while ■McPherson and Logan 
with only 20,000 men met and defeated one of the best 
planned and best executed attacks to the left, rear and 
front, made in the cam])aign. 

(xeneral Scholield, who commanded the Army of the 
Ohio, who was ^^ith General ►-?hernian at the time of the 
iittack of Stewart's corps along the Augusta road, sng- 
gested to Sherman to throw his corps bcldnd and on the 
Hank of Stewart, thus breaking Stewart ^'> communication 
with the intrenchments of Atlanta, bnt S:?erman for some 
1 easou did not approve it. 

After the battle of tlie 22d we swung from the left to 
the right, and it fell to my lot to hold the lines while the 
i-est of the army drew out. ^ I heard of the change of com- 
mand of the Army of the Tennessee from General Logan 
to General Howard. I did not know the reasons, but felt 
that the little army that had served under Grant, 8her- 
}nan, McPherson and Logan, and had fought a battle all 
day, part of the time by itself, without a commander, and 
had whipped the whole of Hood's army, had certainly left 
in it material enough to command itself. I had never met 
General Howard, and ^vliile I knew him to be an experi- 
enced and no'od soldier, it made no difference in my feel- 
ings; and I think after Howard cor.imanded tlivit army 
and placed it in battle, felt its pulse and saw what it was, 
he would have felt just as we did. On the march frum the 
left to the extreme right I saw General Sherman at a log 
house. General Logan was sitting on the porch; he hardly 
recognized me as I walked in, and I saw a great change 
in him. I asked General Sherman what the (diange in 
commanders meant, why Logan was not left in command. 
As everyone knows, Logan's independence and criticisms 
in the army were very severe, but they all knew what he 
was in a fight, and whenever we sent to Logan for aid 
he would not only send his forces, but come himself; so, 
as Blair said, we only knew Logan as we saw him in 
battle. 



22 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

Logan could hear every word that was said between 
Sherman and myself. Sherman did not feel at liberty to 
say anything, in explanation of this change. He simply 
put me ofl very firmly but as nicely as he could, and spoke 
highly of General Howard, who had been given the com- 
mand. I went away from the place without any satisfac- 
tion, and when I met Logan on the outside I expressed to 
him my regTets, and I said to him: "There is something 
here that none of us understand," and he said: "It makes 
no difference; it will all come right in the end." The first 
meeting I had with General Howard was on that morn- 
ing, and I wish to say that while I remained with him and 
ever since the war, there has been no one that was kinder 
to me, or who has said kinder things. I am sorry it was 
not my fortune to have been able tO' follow him through 
to Washington. 

During the battles around Atlanta, and after we had 
gone from the left to the right, it was my misfortune to 
be given a Confederate leave. I was supposed to be fatally 
wounded. The doctor reported to Sherman, and he, desir- 
ing to keep the news from my family, instructed every 
telegraph operator to send only his dispatches, but in 
doing this he forgot that there was nothing that could 
occur but what went over the Avires immediately. So the 
news reached my people that I had been fatally wounded. 
Dispatches came to my staff, trying to obtain the facts, 
but they could not reply because of Sherman's orders. In 
talking about it afterwards he said: "I acted from my 
instincts. I simply wished to send the truth, but I only 
succeeded in making trouble, and that has always hap- 
pened to me when I tried to be extra cautious; I always 
l)ut my foot in it; some smart Aleck gets ahead of me." 

As soon as Sherman heard I was wounded he came to 
my tent with Dr. Kidd, his chief surgeon, and found a sur- 
geon of my own corps in charge of me. As soon as the 
shock of the wound passed away I gradually became con- 
scious as to hearing, but not as to seeing, and the first 
words I heard were when Sherman turned on Dr. Kidd 
and said: "Kidd, Dodge is not going to die. See, he is 
coming to all right." You can imagine what my feelings 
were on hearing talk of that kind from Sherman. I recog- 
nized his voice, and also the fact that probably I was 
badly hurt. The doctors advised Sherman to send me 
North, but Sherman said: "No, we can keep Dodge two 
w^eeks, and then he will be all right; we wixnt him with 
his corps." I considered the faet that he would not let me 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 23 

go to the rear until he was forced to swing aroimd south 
of Atlanta, and abandon ever^'thing to the north, one of 
the greatest compliments he ever paid me. 

I was taken to Greenville, Ind., to a relative, for a rest 
before I was sent tO' my own home in Iowa. The first or 
second evening after I arrived in Greenville, as I lay upon 
my cot, I listened to the demonstrations being made by 
the return of the delegates who had been to Chicago and 
nominated McClellan. I was astonished and indignant to 
hear cheer after cheer given at the station for Jefferson 
Davis. I could hardly realize that I w^as in a northern 
state, not having been North before since the beginning of 
the war. I now realized what was meant by the term 
"Copperhead" and "Fire in the Rear.'' As soon as I was 
able, I sat down and wrote this to Sherman. It w^as some 
time afterwards when I received his answer, which is too 
characteristic to publish, but it said "We will settle w4th 
those fellows after we get through down here." 

It was on the first of September that I parted with the 
Army of the Tennessee. During my convalescence I '\'is- 
ited General Grant and that magnificeut Army of the 
Potomac at City Point. As soon as able, I had orders to 
proceed to Vicksburg, and it was the intention while 
Sherman marched to Savannah that I should take a col- 
umn from somewhere in that country and get to the rear 
of Mobile, but at Cairo I received dispatches from General 
Grant to repair to St. Louis, and there I fell to the com- 
mand of the Department of the ^Missouri, relieving Gen- 
eral Rosecrans. The first order I received came from Stan- 
ton; it was a complimentary message from Grant, telling 
me I must send everything I could to help Thomas at 
Xashville, and I sent out of that Department every organ- 
ized force. When the battle of Nashville was fought I 
had not an organized regiment in my Department. 

I found General Sherman's family in St. Louis, and, 
naturally, coming from an old commander like him, it 
was m}^ pleasure to do anything and everything I could 
for his family. Mrs. Sherman was trying to soften the 
hardships of war by getting people out of prison, and by 
relieving their necessities. There had been a great many 
arrests made. I found the prisons full and commenced 
emptying them, with the idea that it was a great deal 
cheaper to let these people talk than to feed them, but I 
got one or two severe repimands for so doing. I know 
that Mrs. Sherman wrote to the General and told him 
what I was doing, and how kind I was to her, and how I 



24 PERSONAL KECOLLECriONS OF 

carried out any requests she made so far as it was pos- 
sible for me to do so; and Sherman, still looking after my 
interests as he had ayways done, wrote me a letter and 
said: "You must not issue these orders and release these 
people simply because Mrs. Sherman recpiests you to do 
so. You must use your own judgment in this matter, 
and only issue orders where you know it is ab- 
solutely right." He said it in a kindly way, and 
he said a great many other things in his letter to me 
about ni3^ policy. He also said : ''I appreciate fully what 
you are doing, and why you do it, but, my dear General, 
you know you must still cling to a soldier's duty.'' 

A^^hile I was in command of that Department Lee and 
Johnston surrendered. I had received an order from Sec- 
retary Stanton instructing me to pay no attention to the 
Sherman and Johnston parole. During this excitement a 
dinner was given, at the Lindell Hotel that brought 
together the loyal people of St. Louis, to which I was 
invited as commander of that Department. I was aston- 
ished to hear Union people get uf> and denounce Sherman, 
criticizing not only his acts but his motivts. I listened as 
long as I could to these excitable s}>eakers, and finally g(»t 
up and stated that T had served near and under Sherman 
for two years, and while I knew nothing at all about the 
terms of surrender of Johnston except the ordeis I had 
received from the Government — nevertheless I did not 
propose to sit at any dinner table, or any assembly of any 
kind, where the loyalty of Sherman was questioned; tliat 
whatever he had done, whether right or wrong, had been 
done by a soldier who had but one thing at heart, his duty 
to his country and the destruction of the rebel aimy. It 
Avas not very long after this before my words reached 
Sherman. They brought back the kind of response t'lat 
he made in such cases; and it was only a short time after 
this until Sherman himself appeared at his home in St. 
Louis, the war being virtually over, and being an old resi- 
dent of that city, it was natuial when he arrived that the 
people should seize upon him and pay him great attention, 
take him out to dinners, etc. A great many of his old 
friends were rebels, and I suppose they saw in his terms 
to Johnston an opportunity to break the force of the 
Union sentiment against them, for there was no place in 
the whole United States where the bitterness of the 
- Ii nion and Eebel sentiment was so apparent as it was in 
the State of Missouri. It kept the State in dissensions 
during the entire war. The attentions of the sympathizers 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 25 

with the rebellion to Sherman were very marked, so much 
so that some of the Union people called upon me and 
talked to uie about it, and when iSherman came down to 
my headquarters, as he did daily, I spoke to him about 
it, and told him how they were talking and how they felt. 
He said: "They are going to give me a dinner here in a 
few days, and General, don't you worry, I will settle that 
question there." He made a remarkable speech at that 
dinner. He said that since the war was over he did not 
feel that it T\as necessary for him to refuse any attentions, 
no matter from whom they came, btit when it came to the 
question between loyal men and rebels every one knew 
where his heart was, and everyone knew w^hat liis 
thoughts were; that it was only the clemency of the gov- 
ernment saved them from receivin'g their just dues long- 
before this time. We never heard any more in that coun- 
try as to Sherman's position, and no one after that misun- 
derstood him. At this banquet given in his honor at the 
Lindell Hotel, St. Louis, July 20, 1865, Sherman in the 
course of his speech said : ''You cannot attain great suc- 
cess in war without great risks. I admit we violated many 
of the old established rules of war by cutting loose from 
our base and exposing sixty thousand lives, but when a 
thing has got to be done it has got to be done. I had faith 
in the army I commanded ; that faith was well founded. 
But there wag the old story exemplified. We had the ele- 
phant, and it troubled us to know what to do with that 
elephant, and again we had to put our wits together and 
we concluded to kill the elephant. We did not like to do 
it. I come now to a piece of military historv^ which has 
been more discussed than any other. I contended at first, 
when we took Yicksburg, tlmt we had gained a point 
which the Southern Confederacy, as belligerents^ — so rec- 
ognized by ourselves and the world — were bound to 
regard. That when we took Vicksburg, by all the rules of 
civilized warfare they should have stirrendered and 
allowed us to restore Federal power in the land. But they 
did not. I claim also that when we took Atlanta, they 
were bound by every rule of civilized warfare to surrender 
their cause. It was then hopeless, and it was clear to me 
as dayliiiht that they were bound to surrender and return 
to ci^■il life. But they continued the war, and then I had 
a right under the miles of civilized warfare to commence 
a system that would make them feel the power of the Gov- 
ernment, and cause them toi succumb to our national 
authority. I have again and again profPered kindness 



i6 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

towards the people of the South, and I have manifested 
it on thousands of occasions. I lived among them and 
received generous hospitality; but at the same time 'if 
their minds are not balanced so as to reason aright, we 
have the right to apply the rod. So we destroyed Atlanta, 
and all that could be used against us there will have to 
be rebuilt. The question then arose in my mind how to 
apply the power thus entrusted by my Government so as 
to produce the result — the end of the war, which was all 
we desired; for war is only justifiable among civilized 
nations to produce peace. There is no other legitimate 
rule — except to produce peace. This is the object of war, 
and it is so universally acknowledged. Therefore, I had 
to go through Georgia, and let them see what war meant. 
I had the right to destroy their communications, which I 
did. I made them feel the consequences of war, so they 
will never again invite an invading army. Savannah fell, 
as a matter of course. Once in our power, the question 
then arose again, 'What next?' All asked, 'what next?" 
I never received my orders from anybody. I had nobody 
to look to but my own brain. I asked advice again and 
again, but I got mighty little, I can tell you, except from 
Grant, who is always generous and fair. >so advice — no 
word at Savannah, save from Mr. Lin(:oln, who asked 
'what next?' I told him I would tell him after awhile. 

"Then came that last movement, which I do contend 
involved more labor and risk than anything which I have 
done, or ever expect to do again. I could take Charleston 
without going there. First, by segregating it from the 
rest of the country so that it could not live. Man must 
have something to live upon. He must go where there is 
something to eat, therefore I concluded to break up the 
railroads, so the people had tO' get out of Charleston or 
perish. Then the next thing was to place the army in 
Columbia, which I tell you is more of a place in the South 
than you are aware of. Years ago I thought Columbia 
would be the scene of the gi^eat and final struggle of the 
war. I thought our Western army would go Eastward 
and our Eastern army southward to Columbia, and that 
Ave would fight it out there. The people there regard it as 
a place of security. They sent their treasure there and 
their wines and liquors, which my friend Blair remembers 
so well. But if you place any army where the enemy say 
you cannot, you gain an object. All military readers will 
understand the principle; and therefore when I placed my 
armv in Columbia, I fought a battle — I reaped the fruits 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 27 

of a victory — bloodless, but still it produced military 
results. The next question Avas to place my army still 
further where I could be in communication with the old 
army of the Potomac — where we could destroy the life of 
the Confederate annies, for it seemed at one time as 
though they were determined to fight to the 'last ditch.' 

"So we went to Goldsboro, and then I hastened to see 
Mr. Lincoln and Grant for the last time. We talked the 
matter over and agreed perfectly. Grant was moving 
then. I had been fifty odd marching days on light 
rations. My men were shoeless and without pants, and 
needed clothing and rest. I hurried back to Goldsboro, 
and dispatched eveiwthing Avith as great rapidity as I 
could, and on the very day I appointed I started in pur- 
suit of Johnston, let him be where he might. Now under- 
stand that in this vast campaign w^e had no objective 
point on the map; all we had to do was to pursue the Con- 
federate armies wherever they might go and destroy them 
whenever we could catch them. The gTeat difficulty was 
to bring them to bay. You can chase and chase a hare 
until the end of time but unless you bring him to bay you 
cannot catch him. Grant Avas enabled to bring Lee to bay 
by means of Sheridan's cavalry. I did not have sufficient 
cavaliy; if I had, I might have brought Johnston to bay; 
but with my then force I could not, because my cavalry 
was inferior to his in numbers. Therefore, Avhen Lee sur- 
rendered, Johnston saw as clearly as I had seen months 
before, that his cause was gone. I had been thinking of it 
for months; therefore, when he met me and announced 
the fact that he was 'gone up,' I was prepared to receive 
it. It was just like a familiar song. It seemed to the 
North a new thing. We had expected it, and when thev' 
gave up there was an end of it, as we supposed. How did 
they give up, was the question; gave up, that was all. No 
use in fighting any longer. On what terms did they give 
up? I have described sufficiently clear in my official 
report all the conversation that took place, and all I will 
say is that the North seemed to be taken unawares, 
although every paper in the land and every county court 
orator had preached about peace for the last four years; 
yet when it came they did not recognize it. All I claim 
is that I was prepared for it from the start. The moment 
Johnston spoke to me I saw peace at once, and I was 
honest enough to say so, but the world was startled by it. 
'Sherman had turned traitor and Jeff Davis had bought 
him up with Confederate gold.' I rather think he would 



28 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

have found it a pretty hard job to have 'bought me up. 
Poor Davis! I know he never had gold enough to buy me. 
although I ^von't mention my price. But all that is now 
past and I am satisfied in my heart that we have peace. 
I am satisfied that by the combined armies aud navies, 
and the citizens of the North, and many of the South, that 
now we have peace in the land, and what is the conse- 
quence? It is simj)ly one stage anew in our history. We 
have had wars heretofore. Did we cut the throats of our 
enemies? Certainly not; like sensible men, when the war 
was over we went to work to recover what we had lost by 
the war, and entered on a new stage." 

During the year 1865 and the spring of 186G it fell to 
my lot to make the Indian campaign over the plains, and 
to kill a few Indians, and among them a few squaws and 
children — when there was a general outcry raised all over 
the United States, and through the Peace Commissioners 
the whole Indian policy was changed from war tO' treaties 
of peace; and, being desirous of retiring from the army, 
Sherman knowing all my plans, I wrote him in April, 
1 806, a personal letter, asking for a leave of absence, my 
resignation not having been accepted. I have no co])j of 
my letter to him, but he understood the matter fully, for 
we had discussed it together, and in answer to that letter 
I received the following: 

"HEADQUAETEKS iMlLITAPY DIVISION OF THE 
MISSISSIPPI. 

3Iajor-General Dodge. 

Dc^ar General : I have your letter of April 27th, and T 
readily consent to what you ask. I think General Pope 
should be at Leavenworth before you leave, and I 
expected he would be at Leavenworth hj May 1st, 
but he is not yet come. As soon as he reaches Leaven- 
wortli or St. Louis, even, I consent to j^our going to 
Omaha to begin what, I trust, will be the real beginning 
of the great road. I start tomoiTow for Kiley, whence I 
will cross over to Kearney by land, and thence come in to 
Omaha, where I hope to meet you. I will send your letter 
this morning to Pope's office and endorse my request tliat 
a telegraph message be sent to General Poi^e to the effect 
i hat he is wanted at Leavenworth. Hoping to meet you 
soon, I am, Yours trulv, 

W. T. Sherman, M. G." 

General Sherman in his memoirs states that in the year 
1849 lie was sent by General Smith up to Sacramento 



GENERAL W. T. SHEttMAN 29 

City to iustruct Lieutenants Warner aiid Williamson, of 
the Engineers, to push their surv'eys of the Sierra, Nevada 
Mountains, for the purpose of ascertaining the possibility 
of passing that range by a railroad, a subject that then 
elicited universal interest. It was generally assumed 
that such a road could not be made along any of the 
immigrant roads then in use, and Warner's orders were 
to look further North up the Feather River, or some of 
its tributaries. Warner was engaged in this survey dur- 
ing the summer and fall of 1849, and had explored to the 
very end of Goose Lake, the source of Feather River, 
when this officer's career was terminated by death in bat- 
tle with the Indians. General Sherman was too modest 
to add, as was the fact, that those instructions were sent 
at his own suggestion; that that was. the first exploring 
]3arty ever sent into the field for the special piu'pose of 
ascertaining the feasibility of constructing a railwa}' on 
a ]H»rti<m of the line of the trans-continental routes; an<l 
that the exploration preceded b^^ at least four years the 
Act of Congress making appropriations ''for explorations 
and surveys for a, railroad route from the ^lississippi 
River to the Pacific Ocean.'' 

On January 6, 1859, General Sherman addressed a let- 
ter to Hon. John Sherman, jM.C, and made public through 
the "National Intelligence." It is one of the most remark- 
able and instructive short ])apers to be found in thelitera- 
tuie of trans-continental raihvay construction. He gave 
many weighty reasons why a railway to the Pacific 
should be built, but thought it could not be done unless 
done by the nation. "It is a work of giants," he senten- 
tiously declares, "and T'ncle Sam is the only giant I know 
who can or should grapple the subject." That paper 
alone, in the light of later events, would stamp its author 
as a far-seeing statesman and an enliahtened engineer. 
Pie said: "It so ha]ipens that for the past ten years the 
Sierra. Nevada has been crossed at every possible point 
by miners in search of gold, by emigrants going and com- 
ing, and by skillful and scientific men. I, myself, have 
been along a great part of that range, and have nc hesi- 
tation in saying that there are no passes by which a rail- 
way to be travelled by the most i^owerful locomotion now 
in use can be carried through the Sierra Nevada, unless 
at the extreme head of the Sacramento, near the town of 
Shasta or Fort Reading, or at the extreme head of the 
San Joaquin, near the Tajou." 



30 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

And. now I wish to say that if there are any two men 
in the United States who were entitled to the credit of 
enabling us to construct the Union Pacific Railway, out- 
side of those who put their money in it, and made it a suc- 
cess, those two men were Generals U. S. Grant and W. T. 
Sherman. I undertake to say that had it not been for the 
personal, active and always liberal co-operation of the 
armies under their direction, the people who built that 
road and faced its difficulties would liave somewhere 
been stopped. 

During all the time of construction of the Union Pacific 
either Grant or Sherman gave orders that anything Gen- 
eral Dodge asked for should be given to him, because lie 
knows under the regulations what he is entitled to. I 
made some requests upon military commanders that 
were unusual, and I said to the commanders: "I want 
you to obey this, and I will x>rotect you." AMien the offi- 
cial reports of what had been done reached Sherman, he 
wrote me a Idndly letter, but he said to me, ''Don't forget 
not only what your duties are to the Union Pacific, but 
also what your conscience tells you is right towards the 
United States in such circumstances, and what we can 
approve." Of course, it was a nice, quiet, gentle remindei' 
that they trusted me, and I had gone a little beyond what 
they considered was fair to their trust. 

General Sherman came up to look at the first section 
of the road examined after I took charge of the line. If 
you go back and read the records you will see he was 
present. Major Bent, a gentleman who is now at the 
head of one of the greatest industries in this country, was 
assigned to the duty of taking care of the people who 
examined the road. General Sherman said to him: "Every 
time they build a section hei-e I will be on hand to look 
at it, and see that it is properly built." Bent wagered 
with General Sherman a basket of champagne that he 
would not do it. Sherman's headquarters were in St. 
Louis, and we were building and examining about thirty 
miles; of road a month. This Avould have brought him 
to examine the road about once every month; so that 
after we had built about one hundred miles of road he 
wrote to me and said: ''I am not going to come up there 
any longer; I am ready to pay my bet." One evening only 
a short time before he died, at the Union League Club, he 
said to me: "I wish, Dodge, that you would get Bent 
down to New York, and I will pay that basket of cham- 
pagne that I owe him." As the road progressed, as you 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 31 

all know, there was hardly a mile that was not built 
under the protection of the United States forces. Every 
engineer that made its surveys had to be protected 
against the Indians. You alsoi know that the men when 
they started to their work in the morning stacked their 
muskets by their work, ready to fall in at any moment in 
case they were attacked by Indians, and I have often 
known them to fall in and defend their camp. 

Every year w^hile we were building this road Sherman 
went over it, and I reported to him just as regularly as I 
did to my superior ofScers, telling him what I was doing 
and asking his advice. He saw through the papers that 
there was a question between myself as Chief Engineer 
and Mr. T. C. burant, the chief contractor, as to the lines, 
and that Mr. Durant had declared against the lines that 
the engineers of the road had said were the true lines in 
a commercial and engineering point of view, and that I 
had sent word to the company that if the lines were not 
sustained I would have to resign. 

I was in Utah at the time and received a dispatch from 
Durant dated at Laramie, to return there immediately to 
meet Generals Grant and Sherman. I immediately took 
the stage and started for Laramie. When Durant 
received my absolute refusal to accept the lines they had 
adopted, he wired to Sherman, and Sherman to Grant, 
and both caAie to Laramie, thousands of miles, showing 
their interest in the subject. They protested against 
Durant's action, and when I stepped off the stage Durant 
said to me: ''General, I want you to withdraw your dis- 
patch; the lines you want you may have. I am convinced 
that you are right." There I met Grant and Sherman, 
and went over with them the whole possibilities of the 
Union Pacific line, and told them that in my own opinion 
during the year 1S69, with no untoward events, we would 
have the connection. They discussed its probabilities 
and possibilitieSi, and said then and there to me: ''If 
that is your plan. General, whatever you want you may 
have," and they so instructed the commander of that 
Department, and what I asked for I received. 

I have only time to read three letters of the many Gen- 
eral Sherman wrote me on this subject, showing ins 
grasp of the whole problem. 

"St. Louis, Jan. 5, 1867. 

My Dear General Dodge: At New Orleans I received 
your welcome letter from New York, and I assure you, 
on its faith, I boasted not a little of the vast energy of 
our countrvmen; 303 miles of the railroad finished in one 



32 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

yeai' is a feat that may well be boasted of, I assure you 
of my hearty congratulations, and that the greater prob- 
lem of the railroad seems to be solving itself very fast. 

You are exactly right in making your location inde- 
pendent of local influence. When I was at Denver and 
saw the lay of the land, I felt certain that you would 
locate nor-th of that city, and said so-, incidentally, but 
some fellow got hold of it and pitched into me. As it was 
none of my business, I held my tongue and counsel, but 
now the people there will see that though Denver is some, 
still it is not enough, to direct from its course the Great 
National Highw^ay. I also learn with pleasure that your 
Eastern connection is clone within twenty-two miles, and 
I have ordered all troops and stores for the Department 
of the Platte to go via Chicago, Clinton and Omaha. 

The loss of Col. Fetterman's command up at Phil Kear- 
ney may disturb your people; but don't let it, for we shall 
persevere and push that road to A'^irginia City, and it will 
divert the attention of the hostile Sioux from your road. 
The point where you cross the North Platte and Fort 
Laramie will become great military points, and you 
should make arrangements with cars to land there our 
troops and storefc. I take it for granted that you get 
along well with Cooke, and his Quartermaster, Mj^ers. 

I would like to know how far this side of old Cam]) 
Walbach you propose to leave the Lodge Pole. It looked 
to me as if you couJd take the divide some ten miles this 
side, and get up some 700 or 800 feet before you reach the 
Black Hills. I remember well the difficuty in California. 
Our first locations clung to the valleys for some thirty 
miles out of Sacramento, and then it was too late to rise 
the mountains. Whereas now, the road begins to rise at 
once on leaving Sacramento, so that they get up near two 
thousand feet before they strike the mountains. I sup- 
pose your location descends into the Laramie Plains not 
far from Willow Springs Station, twelve miles southeast 
of the new Fort Stevens (John Buford). 

The coming year, for better or worse, is to be an im])OTt- 
ant one to our country, and if you could, by superhuman 
energy, reach the foot of the mountains near Walbach, it 
would be a great achievement. That will be the military 
point for the road. North and South from that point are 
good by reason of the nearness of the wood, the .abundant 
grass and water, and vallej^s that afford good roadways 
for traveling. I will do my utmost that Gen. Cooke have 
force enough to cover your parties absolutely, which will 
be easv from the forlcs of the Platte westw^ard. 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 33 

I came up from New Orleans by rail. Saw our old 
stamping ground, Jackson, Miss.; Canton, Grenada, 
Grand Junction and Jackson, Tenn. I feared somebody 
would offend me, but such was not the case. I saw any 
quantity of old rebels who were as polite as possible. 

Wishing the great enterprise as much success in ISilT 
as in 18C6, I am, as ever, vour friend, 

W. T. Sherman." 

"St. Louis, January 18, 18G7. 

I have just read ^^'ith intense interest your letter of the 
14th, and though you wanted it kept to myself I believe 
you will sanction my sending it to General Grant for his 
individual perusal, to be returned to me. 

It is almost a miracle to grasp your proposition to 
finish to Fort Sanders this year, but you have done so 
much that I mistrust my own judgment and accept yours. 

I regard this road of yours as the solution of the Indian 
affairs, and of the Mormon question, and therefore give 
you all that I possibly can; but the demand for soldiers 
everywhere, and the slowness of enlistment, especially 
among the blacks, limits our ability to respond. Natur- 
ally each officer exaggerates his own troubles, and appeals 
for men; thus Ord is greatly exercised lest the blacks aud 
w^hites commence a war of race, and would have four or 
five regiments scattered over the whole state of Arkansas 
to prevent local trouble. I want to punish and subdue 
the Indians, who are the enemies of our race and prog- 
ress, but even in that it is well sometimes to proceed with 
due deliberation. I have now General Terry on the Upper 
Missouri, General Auger with you, and General Hancock 
just below, all young, enterprising men, fit for counsel or 
the field. I will endeavor to arrange so that hereafter all 
shall act on common principles and with a, common pur- 
pose, aud the first step, of course, is to arrange for the 
accumulation of the necessary men and materials at the 
riiiht points, for which vour railroad is the very thing. 

M. O. 

Auger will be with you before this, and you will find 
him prepared to second you to the utmost of his power. 
I want him to study his problem and call on Grant, 
through me, for the least force that is adequate, for we 
must res]>ect the demand from other quarters. Of course, 
I am disposed to find fault that our soldiers are now tied 
up in the Southern states, but in the light they are now 
regarded, it would be impolitic and imprudent for me to 

L.ofC. 



34 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

say so publicly. All I can do is to keep General Grant 
well informed, so that he may distribute Ms army to the 
best advantage for the whole countiy. 

As to supplies, General Auger will be, and is, at liberty 
to control this question according to the state of facts. The 
staff officers at Omaha are supplied with funds, and are 
on the spot, authorized to buy or call for supplies from 
Chicago or St. Louis. Though west Iowa might supply 
your markets abundantly, yet if suddenly called on for 
millions of pounds of flour, sugar, coffee and bacon, they 
would jump the price, but you know we have now Quar- 
termasters and Commissaries absolutely disinterested, and 
qualified to aiTange this matter. I will surely be up tliis 
year many times, and will go over ever^^ rail more than 
once. I don't want to go to Utah until your road ap- 
proaches Bridger, which cannot be this year; and I don't 
want Congress to bother itself about Mormon affairs 
until then, and the Gentiles would do well to hold their 
tongues and pens until it becomes feasible to act in case 
of laws or threats. It is nonsense now for us to send a 
large force there, and besides, it is impossible, and would 
be to the interests of the Mormons, by the prices they 
would exact of us for meat and bread. 

Don't fail to keep in with General Auger, Myers, etc., 
who can be of service to you in many ways., 

W. T. Sherman, Major General. 

St. Louis, May 7, 1867. 

]My Dear General Dodge: I have your valuable letter 
of Aj^ril 28th, and am fully convinced that you will com- 
plete that road this season to the head of Crow Creek, and 
it may be, to Fort Sanders. Where the spring has been 
so prolonged, I think you ma}^ safely count on a late fall. 
I will not be surprised if you lay rails up to Christmas. 

I think this year is our crisis on the plains, because 
every month and year will diminish the necessity for 
troops in the reconstructed States, and give us more and 
more troops for the plains, especially cavalry. 

I suppose I am in for the excursion up the Mediter- 
ranean. We are advertised to sail for Gibraltar June 8, 
and ought to reach Marseilles July 4. We are then to 
cruise along the Mediterranean and Black Seas, stopping 
at Genoa, Leghorn, Naples, Athens, Constantinople and 
the Crimea (Sebastopol); then out to Smyrna, Beirout, 
Joppa and Alexandria, back to the coast of Spain, and 
out to Medina, and home in October. If you will keep 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 35 

Nichols here advised, he will reach me through General 
Dix at Paris, and I will arrange for General Grant to tele- 
graph me should anything of enough importance occur to 
call me back, in which event, I will be prepared to leave 
the ship and return by way of England. My Departments 
are now well commanded, and should any combination of 
the troops be necessary. General Grant will order. I 
would not go if I thought anything would suffer, but it is 
vain for me to suppose my presence necessary when Gen- 
eral Grant freely offers to spare me. I will bear in mind 
your wish and wil write you some letters from abroad as 
a keepsake, and as evidence of my personal friendship. 
Wishing you and yours all possible happiness, etc. 

W. T. Sherman. 
The tracks were joined at Promontory on May 10, 1869, 
and, not forgetting what Sherman had done to make the 
great transcontinental line a success, I sent him a dis- 
patch when the last spike was being driven. General 
Sherman answered as follows : 

Washington, May 11, 1869. 
General G. M, Dodge: In common with millions, I sat 
yesterday and heard the m^'stic taps of the telegraphic 
battery announce the nailing of the last spike in the great 
Pacific road. Indeed am I its friend. Yes. Yet, am I to 
be a part of it, for as early as 1864 I was Vice-President 
of the effort begun in San Francisco under the contract of 
Robinson, Seymour & Company. As soon as General 
Thomas makes certain preliminary inspections in his new 
command on the Pacific, I will go out and, I need not 
say, will have different facilities from that of 1846, when 
the only way to California was by sail around Cape Horn, 
taking our ships 196 days. All honor to you, to Durant, 
to Jack and Dan Casement, to Reed, and the thousands 
of brave fellows who have wrought out this glorious prob- 
lem, spite of changes, storms, and even doubts of the 
incredulous, and all the obstacles you have now rapidly 
surmounted. W. T. Sherman, General. 

There is no one who has taken so active a part, and 
who has accomplished so much for the benefit of the Gov- 
ernment, in the building of the transcontinental railroads 
as General Sherman. He has taken occasion to look after 
and to speak his mind frankly about them since their con- 
struction, and in September, 1888, in commenting upon a 
paper which was read before th Society of the Army of 
the Tennessee, upon the Transcontinental Railway, he 
spoke as follows: 



36 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

"■I need not speak to an audience such as tMs in praise 
of the historic paper just read by General Dodge. It so 
happened that i was, before the Civil War, during it and 
since, deeply interested in the great problem of a Pacific 
railroad. Every word of General Dodgers paper is true to 
my i3ersonal knowedge, and I endorse every proposition 
he has made. 

When the Civil War was over, you must all remember 
that I was stationed at St. Louis, in command of all the 
troops on the western plains as far out as Utah. I found 
General Dodge as Chief Engineer of the Union Pacific 
Railroad, in the success of which enterprise I felt the 
greatest possible interest. I promised the most perfect 
protection by troops of the reconnoitering, surveying and 
construction parties; and made frequent personal visits, 
on horseback and in ambulance, and noticed that the 
heads of al the parties had been soldiers during the civil 
w^ar. I firmly believe that the Civil War trained the men 
Avho built that great national highway, and, as General 
Dodge has so very graphically described, he could call on 
any body of men to 'fall in,' 'take arms, form platoons and 
companies,' 'deploy as skirmishers' and fight the maraud- 
ing Indians just as they had learned to fight the rebels 
down at Atlanta. I will not claim that they were all of 
the Army of the Tennessee, but the heads of the parties 
were all, or nearly all^ Union soldiers. 

"I was particularly interested in that part of the paper 
wherein is described the discovery of the way to cross the 
Black Hills beyond Cheyenne. There was no Cheyenne 
then. They were limited by the law to llg foot grade to 
the mile. Instead of following the valley of Lc^dge Pole 
Creek, as all previous engineers had done, he chose the 
upper or anti-clinal line, instead of the lower, or sin-clinal 
line. This was a stroke of genius, by which they sur- 
mounted the Rocky Mountains by a grade of eighty feet 
to the mile, whereas by any other route then known he 
would have been forced tO' a grade of 200 feet, or to adopt 
short curves through the Laramie Pass. 

"The Union and Central Pacific Railroads were the 
pioneer transcontinental roads in America, and every 
man who did his part should receive all honor. Now there 
are five transcontinental railroads, the last Ihe Canadian 
Pa<-ific. 

It so happened that two years ago, having traveled by 
ever^^ other, I expressed a wish to return from San Fran- 
cisco eastward by the Canadian Pacific, just completed. 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 37 

To iiiY amazement, I discovered that the President of that 
railroad was ^^fajor W. C. "^'au Home, one of our railroad 
men, edncated in onr war between JS'asln ille and xltlanta. 
He was then, as now, the President of tliat railroad, with 
a salary of from 125,000 to .^50,000, and they talked of 
jnaking- him a Dnke. He can hold his own with any Duke 
I have thns far encountered. Anyhow, he acted like a 
Prince to me. From his office in Montreal he ordered his 
agent at Victoria, in British Columbia, to extend to Gen- 
eral Sherman every possible courtesy, which was done. T 
had a special cat* for myself and daughter, Lizzie, with 
l>rivilege of stopping oA^er at any station.. 

"On my way east A^ard 1 met many people and heard many 
things of deep interest to me, and, may-be, to you. There 
are three nlountain ranges between the Mississippi, or 
rather, the Missouri Valley, and the Pacific Ocean, the 
Pockies, the Wasatch and the Cascades. These converge 
to the northwest, so that in the Canadian Pacific the 
engineers had to meet them closer together than by our 
Xorthern Pacific or by the Central and Union. 

In the first explorations the English ngineers saw no 
escape from the conclusion that to pass these ranges from 
their starting point on to the Pacific, ^^ancouver, a mag- 
nificent port, they would have to follow thegrade of Fraser 
River, by its west branch, to its very head, near the Henry 
House, and thence descend the Athabasca eastward to 
Winnipeg, etc. This route was about 400 miles longer 
than the direct line. The board of directors in Montreal 
then called on our United States experienced engineers, 
and found a man who undertook to cut across this great 
bend or loop. 

"Instead of following the Avest branch of the Fraser 
Piver, he took the east branch, Thompson's, up to the 
Kamloops' lake. The mountains eastvrard seemed im- 
passable, but he reasoned 'wliere there's a will there's a 
Avay.' Through brush and trees he forced his way, and 
found a pass in the Cascade range called Kicking Horse, 
Avhere his horse had kicked liim on his kuee. Persever- 
ing, he, in the next or main range, obserA^ed the flight of 
an eagle, which did not, as usual, pass over the highest 
visible peak but disappeared around a point; so he fol- 
lowed the same course, found an unexpected break, and 
located a railroad Avith less grades than the Union Pacific, 
and saA^ed a distance of four hundred miles, or twenty 
millions of dollars. 



33 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

"In looking- over the usual time-tables of the Canadian 
Pacific, you will find the Kicking Horse and Eagle Pass 
through which millions of people will travel and millions 
of dollars of freight will pass. All are, in part, the conse- 
quence of our Civil War, and the men it educated." 

On December 21, 1884, Col. F. D, Grant informed me 
that he had just come from Dr. Fordyce Baker, who told 
him that his father could not live long; perhaps a month 
or two, perhaps not so long. He said that Governor Fish 
and Dr. Newman were the only ones that knew it. I was 
thunderstruck, for only the Sunday before I was at the 
house, and the General looked fairly w^ell, though I knew 
he w^as much distressed. 

I told Colonel Grant that Sherman was in the city, and 
suggested going down and telling him how^ sick his father 
was, and have him see him. We went to the Fifth Avenue 
Hotel and found General Sherman, who said he was in 
good health; was troubled some with asthma, but was 
full of work, attending to meetings, etc., etc. Colonel Fred 
said to General Sherman: "I think my father's History 
tells more of what you. did than your own memoirs." Sher- 
man said: "Well, when Grant writes anything we can all 
depend on getting the facts. When he Avrites and says 
himself w^hat was done, and what he saw, no sodleir need 
fear; but when others write what he does and says, it is 
not always so." Col. Fred said he had been having con- 
siderable trouble with the publishers or editors of the 
Century, who were to publish the war articles, Shiloh, 
Vicksburg, Wilderness and Appomattox, and that they 
had made his father very angry; that they wanted him to 
change the word rebel in his articles to confederate and 
the word union to federal, lie said that finally Genei'al 
Grant wrote a short letter demanding that his articles be 
published as written. Fred further said that his father 
had written three articles, but that he did not believe he 
would write any more. Sherman said: "This trying to 
soften treason by expunging the words of the General 
was wrong, and that if it kep^ on, pretty soon the sons of 
Southern soldiers would consider it as much of an honor 
that their fathers fought under Lee as the sons of a Union 
General that their fathers fought under Grant r that the 
line of union and rebel, of loyalty and treason, should be 
always kept distinct." I remarked: "As long as our 
friends live it will, but the tendency all the time is to wipe 
out history, to forget it, forgive, excuse and soften, and 
when all the soldiers pass from this age it will be easy 



GENERAL W. T. SHERMAN 39 

to slip into the idea that one side was as good as the 
other. It looks as though it was that way today." Sher- 
man said: ''It was a conspiracy until Sumter was fired 
upon, after that it was a rebellion." 

During a trip from New York to Cincinnati to attend a 
meeting of the Society of the Army of the Tennessee, the 
question of the transcontinental lines came up, and Sher- 
man expressed a wish that when the lines from Portland, 
Oregon, which were being connected by way of Tacoma 
and Seattle, and so on north to the Canadian Pacific, were 
completed, we could make a trip, starting from New York 
and going by way of California, and thence north and 
back by way of the Canadian Pacific, ending our trip and 
making the circle complete in New York. I said to him : 
"General, whenever that connection is made I will take 
a. car, and we Avill make the trip. You shall select your 
party. I have never seen the Canadian Pacific, and I will 
wait and go with you." 

A short time before he died, in 1891, he was in my office 
in New York, and was standing at the window looking at 
the grand view of New York bay. He said to me: ''Dodge, 
have you noticed that that line betweem Seattle and the 
Canadian Pacific is nearly completed?" I answered, and 
said I had not, but when it was I was ready to make the 
trip. 

I left New York a few days afterward. AVhen I reached 
Omaha I received a telegram from his family, and was 
called back to attend his funeral, and while he lay dead 
in New York the connection of those lines was made. It 
was the only thing which he seemed to express a great 
desire to aecomplish before he rounded up his life, and it 
is the regret of my life that he was unable to do so. 

We see, then, that General Sherman, as a soldier, and 
William Tecumseh Sherman as a citizen, were distinctly 
two different men. Sherman as a soldier asked nothing, 
would take nothing except duty from his subordinates, 
and he gave nothing but absolute loyalty and duty to a 
superior. He had the good will of every man who worked 
under him. I know of no man who ever received an order 
to make a march or go into battle, bu felt he would make 
the one successful and win the other. Sherman had the 
nickname in the Army of the Tennessee of the "Old Ty- 
coon," but the soldiers knew that he protected and looked 
after their interests, and they knew he would take care 
of them. 



40 PERSONAL RECOLLECTIONS OF 

General Shermau after the war, wlieu he came into 
civil life, was one of the most generous of men. The old 
soldiers and commanders who served under him, he could 
not be too gracious to. At every opportunity he would 
push them to the front. At a dinner, at his club, or at 
his home, he had a nice way or faculty of making every 
soldier believe that he had done something wonderful, or 
he gave him the credit of having done something that 
would give him a standing wherever he Avas. 

He spent a great portion of his income for the personal 
good of old soldiers, and no person could have traveled 
with him, as I have done, and see the expressions of love, 
sympathy and respect he received, but would value him 
as I do for his large generosity and great deeds after the 
war. And, as a statesman his writings and speeches 
stamp him as able to grapple with any national problem. 

It seems almost impossible for us who knew him from 
the beginning of the war to its close, and then to have 
known him from the close of the war till his death, to 
appreciate the two distinct qualities that made him 
superior in each of his two lives. 

The patience, the firmness, the resolution with which 
he pursued his difficult campaign against Johnston from 
Chattanooga to Atlanta constitute one of the finest 
achievements in history. The boldness of conception, the 
ingenuity of the plan, the accepting of desperate chances, 
in giving Lee an opportunity to crush him in his campaign 
from Savannah to Goldsboro, will forever give Sherman 
prestige as a bold, fearless, strategical com.mander. Upon 
that campaign alone I am wiling to stake Sherman's repu- 
tation for all time. 




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